Unraveling Another Family Collection

For the past two weeks my focus has been on unraveling another family collection. The researcher was a woman who had a great love for her family history and also an interest in joining lineage societies. In the process of her work they were able to join DAR through a third great grandfather.  Others joined SAR through the direct line second great grandfather, but later it was proven that there had been an error in identifying him. He was born in 1792 in Ireland and the family came to America in 1793. There was also a Civil War soldier from the family, the brother of a second great grandfather.

Genealogy Reading - Collecting Free Material Part II

In April 2014 was the first posting under this title. It reflected the reading of periodicals that were picked up from free reading materials at the Genealogical Forum of Oregon. With the reading of those materials there was a wealth of knowledge about the periodicals themselves and about the contents. Recently my visit there gleaned a few books and a copy of Family Tree Magazine and a copy of New England Ancestors. One book was, "A Guide to County Records in the Illinois Regional Archives" and while it is a bit dated, it will provide a glimpse of the holdings of some great resources. For today though my focus in sharing is on the books received from a dear friend who is disposing of her genealogy books. Her life is moving on into another direction and she very kindly is allowing me to distribute her books to repositories where they will benefit other researchers. Before doing so, this is availing me the opportunity to read some great works by some very well-known genealogy professionals and other writers.

50,000 Pageviews

The productivity of a blog just amazes me. In less than five years there have been 50,000 pageviews of Gopher Genealogy. When organizing the blog with myyoungest daughter never would it have occurred to me how many people would take the time to read the posts. These posts are random thoughts from my hours of research, interacting with others and exploring the family histories for many people. Here are some of the statistics for this blog.

SLIG 2015 - Part II

Almost three weeks ago my post SLIG 2015 - Part I was posted and since then there have been 132 views as listed on the website. Others may access the post in other venues. Now for Part II, and understanding people. Over the past nineteen months my time has been consumed by the complicated probate estate of my mother who passed away in June 2013. This time period has been emotionally draining and physically exhausting. A major factor in my endurance was the attendance at SLIG 2014 and SLIG 2015. Salt Lake City feels like a second home to me and the Family History Library is one of my favorite places to research. While my plans did not really involve research there, somehow one becomes propelled into a sense of discovery and being lead to serendipity moments in the materials available.

SLIG 2015 - Part I

It's been ten days since we returned from SLIG (Salt Lake Genealogical Institute) 2015. The intense week in Salt Lake City, Utah was a little wearing on me. It was worth the extra effort and challenges faced in being able to attend the track on Diving Deeper Into New England Research. On arrival Saturday we took a cab to the Family History Library and worked all afternoon on research. It was amazing how much information was found within the collection of books, mostly for New England towns. We did one break in the lunch room and then went to dinner at JBs after leaving the library. Then we decided to walk back to the Hilton Hotel where we were staying. Even though it was four blocks (about a mile) it was not a good decision for me. With neuropathy in my feet it was a bit too far.

Putting Order to a Genealogical Collection

The past week my energy was focused on a client project that had been sitting in my office for six months. While it waited there was another large client project that needed to be completed. Both clients have been very patient and the projects required intense focus on locating documentation for the material provided. It is interesting that every project is so unique. People may collect information over a long period of time and come to a point where they are not sure how to put it all together.

2014 Ends and 2015 Begins

This has been an incredible year for our family. It started out right with attending the Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy, which I am repeating this year. Most of my mother's estate has been taken care of except for the sale of her home and some cemetery issues. My genealogy work continues to evolve and there was some work for other people. There were twenty four classes taught, for a total of 167classes taught in twelve years or 83 in the last three years. For this blog there were 277 posts written and this makes 278. For the last few months my posts have been less frequent and over the holidays there was some down time from computer work altogether.